Sharice Davids traded a career in mixed martial arts for a run at national politics.
Photograph: Courtesy of Sharice Davids

On 1 November 2013, Sharice Davids stepped into the cage for her first professional mixed martial arts fight. Dressed in grey leggings with a pink band around the waist and a black sports bra, Davids paced around her corner of the cage, eyeing her opponent, Nadia Nixon, as the ring announcer roared their names to the eager crowd in Kansas City, Missouri.

At the sound of the bell, Davids leapt forward and landed a clean left hook that sent her opponent tumbling to the mat. The crowd cheered as Davids mounted her opponent and continued her onslaught. Not long afterwards, the referee separated the fighters and allowed Davids back to her feet. She had won her first professional fight in less than two minutes.

Sharice Davids won her first professional fight by submission in November 2013.

The Kansas native was calm, precise and brutally effective in victory – a perfect start to what could have been a fruitful career. Though it was clear that Davids belonged in the fight game, few realized that the stage she was destined to compete on would be the political arena.

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For Davids, her dual lifestyle as a public servant and a fighter has existed since college. “I had my first [amateur] fight towards the end of 2006 and I finished my bachelor’s degree in May of 2007,” Davids tells the Guardian during a telephone interview.

As a child, Davids was fascinated with martial arts. She was obsessed with Bruce Lee, admiring his work ethic and discipline, and mimicked him by wearing a black belt around the house. However, despite her fascination with Lee, Davids did not begin practicing martial arts until she was a 19-year-old college student.

“I didn’t get to train because I was raised by a single mom,” Davids says, recalling her childhood. “There were three of us and it was just too expensive to pay for me to do martial arts practice.”

Davids started by learning capoeira and karate. She then moved on to taekwondo with a coach who had experience training MMA professionals. After several months together, the coach asked if she would be interested in fighting in a local MMA event. Davids had little interest in participating in what she believed was a barbaric sport. Over time, however, Davids learned more about the sport, as well as the training regimen that fighters go through in preparation for bouts.

By 2006, Davids was prepared to take a leap of faith. She made her amateur debut at the International Sport Combat Federation’s Midwest FightFest, and won in less than a minute. Victory was exhilarating but Davids decided to instead to focus on her studies at Cornell law school. She knew better than to try to make a career out of the sport she had grown to love.

“... I was done trying to take MMA fights.” Photograph: Courtesy of Sharice Davids

“In terms of career options, I didn’t think about MMA at all,” says Davids. “I don’t know if I really thought it was a career path for many women. For someone like me, even in my prime, it wasn’t something I really considered.”

In February, 2007 — less than a year after Davids made her amateur debut — Gina Carano and Julie Kedzie competed in the first women’s MMA fight to air on live television — a groundbreaking moment for women who sought a career in MMA. Davids and a group of her friends gathered that night to watch the historic fight.

Within a few years, the sport had changed dramatically. The charismatic and supremely talented Ronda Rousey was on her way to becoming one of UFC’s biggest draws, and her sudden rise to stardom led to the creation of a women’s UFC bantamweight division. Suddenly, it seemed as though there were more female fighters getting into the sport than ever before. Even Davids began to ask herself whether her time had finally come.

When the UFC announced a 115lbs women’s edition of The Ultimate Fighter (TUF) — a reality show that places fighters in a mansion for several weeks as they work their way through a tournament for a “six-figure UFC contract” — Davids jumped at the opportunity. “I had been so passionate about martial arts for so long that I felt that I wanted to at least try, which is why I took my first pro fight.”

Davids won her first pro fight by submission, but lost the second before signing up for the TUF tryouts in Las Vegas. She was overwhelmed by the scene in front of her: hundreds of young fighters grappling on the mats as judges looked on. “It was surreal,” Davids says. The competition was fierce and by the end of the day, she knew she would be taking a one-way trip back to Kansas.

“You train for 12 years of your life and you get three minutes to demonstrate that to a panel of people who will be deciding if you get to be in the UFC or not,” Davids says. “When I didn’t make it on [the show], I felt that – while I would always be a martial artist – I was done trying to take MMA fights.”

When Davids returned to Kansas, she shifted focus. She began to travel the United States and live on Native American reservations to work with the communities. She has since become a nationally recognized expert on economic and community development programs and initiatives for Native Americans. By 2016, she was one of 16 people selected to participate in the White House Fellowship program.

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Davids’s time in Washington DC came during the Obama-Trump transition period. In many ways, it was the spark that kindled her career in politics: “It pushed me a little quicker into something like running for office,” Davids explains.

According to Davids, women are underrepresented in the US federal government. This is particularly evident in Congress, where she believes citizens “need to have the option to vote for qualified women.” Davids is not alone in her thinking — a record-setting 309 women, Republicans and Democrats alike, are running for the US House of Representatives in 2018.

“The fact that we are in 2018 and we are still seeing all these firsts is mind-boggling to me. When I stop and think about it, it makes me very proud to be a part of this movement that is happening in our country. I feel like all of us are playing a role in this. This unprecedented number of women running for office – myself and a couple of other candidates are native women – makes me very proud.”

Though Davids was working hard in pursuit of her political dreams long before she knew she had the opportunity to make history, she admits it adds a sense of gravitas to what she hopes to achieve, and gives her a feeling that only fighters can relate to.

“It is like being in the third round of a fight and you’ve already pushed as hard as you can in the entire fight and then you hear your coach yell ‘10 seconds’ and you get that last little bump of energy. That is what this feels like. I was already running for congress. I was already trying to make an impact.”